Let me say one thing up front: I am not proud to tell this story. It’s a bit embarrassing.
But all good stories, whether serious or comedic, are really about someone’s pain.
And in this story the “pain” falls squarely on me.
It was the summer of 1994. I was about to start my fifth and final year of college at the University of California, Riverside.
A group of friends from my high school days and I went to San Diego’s Mission Bay for a week.
As had been our tradition the two previous years, we took an RV to Campland on the Bay to do what most guys in their early 20s do — party.
I first discovered Campland back in 1985 when my mom took me and my buddy Jerome there for a week.
With the exception of one year, my mom took me and my friend Tito to Campland every summer until 1990 when I graduated high school. (Yes, that same Tito)
At that point in our early adult lives we figured it was best to make the trip without any parents present.
With mom out of the picture, Tito and I started inviting other friends of ours down to Campland.
Most of us in that group all have terrific memories of our summer fun on the Bay.
I also made lifelong friends that I first met when they and their families were camping there too.
Now back in 1994 as you know we didn’t have smart phones in our pockets.
The Internet wasn’t even a word that had entered the vocabulary of the general population.
Once you were in Campland, you were essentially cut off from the world you left behind.
I think that was part of the charm of the place — we really were in a separate world that had it’s own unique characters and set of rules.
The only way back to the “real world” was to leave the camp ground or make a phone call at one of the pay phones typically located next to the community bathrooms/showers.
As our intention was to drink heavily and ensure we didn’t have too much blood in our alcohol systems, my buddies and I typically reserved a RV spot as close to the bathrooms as possible since we knew there would be frequent trips once the seal was broken.
On the ’94 trip, more often than not we’d see the same young guy on the pay phone by the bathoom building closest too our RV.
One day my friend Eric (whose parents somehow allowed us heathens to take their RV to Campland for a week) noticed something familiar about this guy with his ear glued to the pay phone’s receiver.
“Hey Brian,” Eric said, “Doesn’t that guy look a lot like Wesley Crusher?”
I turned and took a closer look at the guy on the phone.
Yep. The guy certainly had an incredible resemblance to Wil Wheaton who played Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Both Eric and I were and remain big Star Trek fans.
The Next Generation had recently wrapped up it’s seventh and final season and we were looking forward to the crew of the Enterprise-D moving on to the big screen with William Shatner in Generations that upcoming fall.
The next time I went up to use the bathroom and saw the guy on the payphone I asked him, “Has anyone ever told you that you look a lot like Wil Wheaton?”
Obviously he’d heard the question a million times as he simply turned his back on me and continued his phone call.
I was pissed. There was no reason for him to be a jerk to me.
It was a legitimate question, even if he’d heard it or a variation of it ever since Wil Wheaton starred in Stand By Me.
Now at that point in my life one of my greatest faults was that I could not let even the smallest slight go unanswered.
Who the hell was this Wesley Crusher doppelganger to turn his back on me?
From that day forward, every time that I passed him while he was on the pay phone, I made a remark.
Sometimes I’d impersonate Patrick Stewart’s Captain Picard and say, “Ensign Crusher, report to the bridge.”
Other times I’d mimic Michael Dorn’s character Worf with “Shields up! The Klingons are attacking!”
Needless to say I gave Mr. Stuck-to-the-Pay-Phone plenty of reasons to turn his back on me the rest of the week.
Then Saturday morning came.
It was our last day at Campland before heading back home to Norco and the real world.
I’d gone over to the communal bathrooms/showers to clean up as well as wake up from yesterday’s partying.
Wrapping up a nice hot shower and dressed in fresh clothes for the beach, I stepped out of my shower stall.
Standing at the sink with his face lathered up as he prepared to shave was the Wil Wheaton lookalike.
He caught sight of me behind him through the mirror and I could read his thoughts in his eyes, which clearly said, “Oh no, not this jerk.”
I shouldn’t have taken it this way, but I considered his look as a sign that I’d prevailed.
I had beaten his insult to me with my endless barrage of passing comments during the week.
I decided to take a victory lap.
I went to the sink directly to his right to brush my teeth as he shaved.
It was at that moment that I began to realize I might have made a mistake with this guy.
Looking at him in the mirror and with my peripheral vision, I noticed his resemble to Wil Wheaton was far greater than I’d picked up on during my numerous trips to past him to the bathroom.
Hmmmm.
I decided to extend an olive branch to him.
“You know,” I said, “You really do look a lot like Wil Wheaton.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I get that a lot.”
I decided to follow up, asking, “Are you like his brother?”
“No,” he said, looking me directly in the eye. “I am Wil Wheaton.”
My heart sank to the soles of my feet.
Without thinking I instantly said, “Dude, I’m so sorry.”
Damn. That didn’t come out right.
I didn’t want him to think I was sorry because he was Wil Wheaton.
I wanted him to know that I was sorry because I was, well to put it bluntly, “this jerk.”
Before I could explain myself, he said, “It’s okay I get it a lot.”
“You do?”
“Yeah. Because of Star Trek.”
Now I was mad.
How could anyone harass him because he was on Star Trek?
Then again, I really wasn’t in the best spot to argue for showing him kindness.
To make up for my week of rude comments, and to engage personally with a cast member of one of my favorite TV shows currently shaving beside, me I decided to keep talking.
“I really liked that last episode where they brought you back with the Traveler,” I said.
He shrugged. “It was all right. It could have been better.”
Damn. This wasn’t going well.
My attitude and alcohol inspired mouth had really screwed up this opportunity I now had before me.
To my surprise, Wil continued speaking. “You know they’re making a movie?”
Excited that he was now chatting with me, I mistakenly replied with too much enthusiasm, “Yeah! It comes out this November!”
A new look of trepidation entered his eyes, but they didn’t say “Oh no, this jerk.” They said, “Oh no, a Trekkie.”
I saw him pull back into himself and I tried to keep the conversation going as he completed his shave.
“Are you in it?” I asked, already knowing that he wasn’t. Yes, I was a hardcore Trekkie. I just didn’t want him to know it.
“Nah,” he said, putting his things back into his shaving kit as he prepared to leave.
I decided to throw a Hail Mary.
“You know,” I said, “If you want party with me and my friends we have an RV full of liquor. You can just hang out and I’ll make sure that no one will talk to you about Star Trek.“
“Thanks, but I don’t drink,” he said and with that left the building.
Man, I couldn’t believe it.
I’d spent a week being a jerk and embarrassing myself in front of a cast member of Star Trek who I should have been hanging out with.
And there was nothing I could do to make it up to him because he didn’t drink.
Or at least told me he didn’t so he could make tracks and get away from the jerk who was also a hardcore Trekkie.
Needless to say, I learned several valuable life lessons from that week, even if it did take me some time and a few more hard knocks to finally implement these lessons.
First, we do indeed reap what we sew.
Second, there’s never an excuse for bad manners.
And third, if you think someone looks like Wil Wheaton or a cast member of your favorite TV show or movie, they probably are!
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